Fish thieves not welcome: Galicians coin term for stereotypical Madrid tourist
Galicia and Spain’s other Atlantic regions are becoming increasingly popular holiday destinations for Spaniards, and people from Madrid in particular, as they turn their backs on overcrowded and overheated Mediterranean resorts in favour of the more temperate north.
But while welcoming the income from tourism, Galicians have also given a nickname to what they see as their notoriously haughty visitors from the Spanish capital: fodechinchos, which translates literally as “fish thieves”.
The Galician writer Ainhoa Rebolledo said a fodechinchos was typically someone from Madrid but that the term could refer to anyone from outside Galicia and generally denoted an ignorant or ill-mannered tourist.
“The typical fodechinchos doesn’t realise there are tides,” she said. “In the Mediterranean the tide is about 20cm and here it’s a matter of metres. The classic fodechinchos gets their car stuck on the beach at high tide.”
Fodechinchos are also accused of insisting on a free tapa with their drink, a tradition in Andalucía but not in Galicia, nor in Madrid for that matter, and of complaining that the signage is in Galego, even though the Galician language is readily understandable to any Spanish speaker.
